Deadly Sins (17 page)

“Jo.” His voice was as gentle as he could make it. “You have no worries in that department.”

She looked as though she’d like to say more, but she finally nodded. “Suffice it to say there will be no leaks from the vault that is Adam Raiker, is that it?”

“I can’t afford to give them any reason to remove me. You want Byron’s killer.” Moodily, his attention shifted to Shepherd’s and Jaid’s actions in the next room. “So do I.”

She touched his arm. “All right. I was just checking. Because that what’s I do. Micromanage. You love that about me.”

His lips curved in an unwilling smile. “So I have a weakness for pushy women, is that it?”

“Or strong ones.” She inclined her head toward the occupants in the next room. “I remember her, you know. At least her name. Byron mentioned her a time or two all those years ago.” She waited, but Adam said nothing. Everything within him had gone still. “Don’t you want to know what he said?”

He finally found his breath. “I don’t think so.”

She told him anyway. “He thought you’d finally met your match.” Her tone went wistful at the memory. “He was positively gleeful at the prospect. Byron was certain she was the one who would settle you down. But then LeCroix happened and everything changed.”

“LeCroix didn’t end Jaid and me,” he said shortly. He’d started that process himself in the weeks before his capture by the savage child killer. Everything in his life changed after he killed the pedophile and landed in the CCU for the next several months. But not him and Jaid. They’d been over before that.

She’d just taken a bit more convincing.

“Life goes by so fast, Adam. Everything we have is so fleeting.” The throb of tears in Jo’s voice had his attention swerving to her. “Don’t miss an opportunity to grab a chance at happiness. You’re as deserving as anyone else, even if you are one of the most maddeningly reticent men I’ve ever met.”

He smiled as he was meant to. And was silently grateful she’d edged the sentiment with humor. Emotions were sticky entanglements that always clouded judgment. He preached that to his operatives. Most of the time he could suppress his own. It was, he was certain, what made him a natural for his job.

But being confronted with others’ emotions, especially those he cared about, always made him feel inadequate.

“If you want to help, you can tell me more about your finances.”

“You asked about it before. I put a list together of our investments. Byron was good about updating things like that.” She left his side to go to a desk in the room Jaid and Shepherd were working in. Jo unlocked a drawer and withdrew a manila envelope. Re-securing the drawer, she made her way back to him.

He took the envelope she handed to him and withdrew the packet of information inside.

“The top sheets are simple listings of who we do business with. The rest gives a bit more information about what that business entails.” Her expression was questioning. “I have to say, Adam, of all the possible motives for Byron’s death, a financial one seems about the most illogical to me.”

His smile was grim as he scanned the top sheet. “You’d be surprised. Money is at the root of the majority of crimes committed in this country.” And emotion was at the root of the rest of them.

One name on the page jumped out at him. Interest surging, he pointed it out to Jo.

“Oh, yes. Dennison International. They’re a global banking firm. Byron was quite impressed with the broker there. Why? Have you heard of them?”

He had, although he wouldn’t be telling Jo where. His attention drifting back to the page, he wondered at the irony that Byron was in business with the same company that employed Joseph Bailey.

Congressman Newell’s oldest grandson.

“Well, we were looking for intersections,” Jaid murmured, head bent over the paper Adam held. “Here they are in spades.”

“But what does it mean?” Shepherd was at a near stop in the congested downtown traffic. Dennison International was located on I Street in the center of DC’s bustling financial district. “So Bailey works for the same company Reinbeck has investments with. He’s not the broker named on the account is he?”

“No.” Jaid leaned over to get a better look at the list Adam had gotten from Mary Jo Reinbeck. “But he’s got reason to have nursed a grudge against Reinbeck all this time. And Dennison International is also listed as a client for Patterson Capital.” She looked up at Adam, found him much too close. For the first time she realized she was practically in his lap.

Straightening hastily, she continued, “Is his number by any chance listed on Patterson’s incoming message logs?”

“Not his personal number, no.” Since Adam didn’t have to consult his case file before answering, she knew he’d already had the thought and checked it out. “But two cell phones registered to the company are. And Bailey’s position there means he might have had access to one of those phones.”

“Maybe I should call Assistant Director Hedgelin and advise him of our next interview.” This could be potentially more explosive than the one with Newell yesterday. The man had gotten positively ballistic when Adam had introduced the topic of his grandson.

“Wouldn’t hurt.” Agent Shepherd’s gaze met hers in the rearview mirror. “If he’s going to get an irate call from the senator, he would appreciate the forewarning.”

She took out her phone, very much aware that Adam hadn’t rendered an opinion. Amazing how loud his silence could be sometimes. Deliberately, she tapped in the assistant director’s number. This would be an opportunity to let him know that they’d struck out with the search of Reinbecks’ computers and cell phones. Sorenson remained their best link to the spyware infecting the judge’s phone.

And keeping her mind on the investigation remained Jaid’s best chance of forgetting the questions that still burned regarding the events at Adam’s last night.

Heath Carroll steepled his fingers in front of his chin and looked suitably somber. “A terrible tragedy. I’m still trying to wrap my head around the judge’s death. Of course, I’ve left a message for Mary Jo expressing my condolences.”

“I’m sure she appreciates that. She told me today how impressed her husband was with you. Where did the two of you meet?”

The broker visibly brightened at Adam’s words. “She said that? It means a lot to me, more than you can know. Justice Reinbeck . . . well, he’s a hero, isn’t he? Or he was. I’ve long admired what he stood for. We shared some of the same worldviews, I guess you could say. As for where we met, you might say that you brought us together, Mr. Raiker.”

Jaid looked at Adam, shocked. His expression didn’t change, but she read his surprise in the slight hesitation before his next word. “Me?”

“Yes, we met at the Boys and Girls Club fund-raiser held a couple months ago. You were one of the speakers.” Because she was watching, Jaid noted Adam’s barely perceptible wince at the reminder. She recalled what the priest had said when she and Adam had stopped by there. That he occasionally prevailed on Adam to speak at fund-raisers for pet projects of his.

The smile Carroll graced them with was boyish. “You’ll be glad to know that I was taken enough with your speech to part with several thousand dollars for Monsignor Benton’s cause. When I stopped to introduce myself to Justice Reinbeck, he said the two of you were friends. We had quite a long conversation that evening. Followed it up with a meeting here in my office a few weeks ago when he and Mary Jo started an account with me.” He stopped himself, as if just realizing the breach of confidentiality. “By your presence here, I’m assuming you know of the Reinbecks’ business with the firm.”

Jaid couldn’t recall a time when she’d seen Adam look so uncomfortable. Intrigued, she murmured, “That must have been some speech.”

Carroll had recovered. Smoothing his thinning blond hair, he said enthusiastically, “It really was. He only spoke for a few minutes, but the crowd was captivated. It’s not every day that you get a glimpse into the mysterious Adam Raiker’s childhood.”

Shock sliced through her, quick and brutal. “No,” she agreed around a suddenly full throat. “It certainly isn’t.” It was particularly hard to imagine the uncommunicative man next to her spilling his secrets to a room full of strangers, so she figured he’d given them only what was necessary to part them from their money for the fund-raiser.

But as little as that may have been, it still represented more than he’d ever shared with her in the fourteen months they’d been lovers.

“Was there anyone else from your company there that night?” Shepherd quizzed the man.

“Several as I recall. The Boys and Girls Club is on our yearly donations list. Many probably support it personally as well.” He named a few colleagues he recalled seeing there. “But it was a huge crowd. People coming and going all night. I really can’t say for sure.”

“How about Joseph Bailey?” With effort Jaid hauled her attention off the now silent man at her side. “Do you recall if he was there?”

“Joe?” Carroll thought for a moment. “I can’t say specifically. But he’s here today if you’d like to ask him yourself.”

“We would.” She summoned a small smile. “This is a pretty big outfit. I wasn’t sure you’d know him.”

The broker leaned back in his chair and hooked an ankle across the opposite knee. “Joe’s only been here a few years, but he’s interned in several departments. Mine was the last before he got his license. We have a mentoring program for new brokers. I’m one of his.”

Connections and more connections, Jaid thought. “I understand your firm also does business with Patterson Capital.”

The wince on Carroll’s face was barely discernible, but it was there. “We do, yes. Oliver Patterson’s death was a terrible shock. And, I don’t mind saying, it makes a tenuous financial recovery even more so.”

“Your company has a couple cell phone numbers that showed up on Oliver Patterson’s business cell records.” Shepherd leaned forward and gave Carroll a slip of paper with the two numbers written on them. “Do you recognize either of these?”

“Yes, the first one is for my exclusive use.” He gave a firm nod, looked back up at them. “The other is an extra used in my department by interns or assistants doing some routine information updating. I’m surprised that these are the only cells showing up on that list, however. I’m certain the senior partners would have had occasion to contact Mr. Patterson from time to time.”

“We’re interested only in the text messages that were exchanged.”

“Really?” The broker looked intrigued by Shepherd’s answer but didn’t ask the questions he seemed to have. “Well, I have done so, certainly.” He looked abashed. “Ridiculous how quickly we get used to the convenience of technology. I’d use a text rather than e-mail or a phone call when it was quicker.”

“Did you have occasion to send him text messages in the last month or so before his death?”

“Let me see.” Without being asked he took a cell phone out of his pocket and checked the call log. “Yes, here’s one. And another . . .” Swiftly, he counted. “Six all told, in the last five weeks.” He gave them a sheepish grin. “I’m terrible about cleaning out my out-box.”

“May I see?” Jaid took the phone from him and read each text. All had been accounted for on Patterson’s phone log, which they’d consulted on the way over. None of the ones on Carroll’s phone contained a link.

She handed it back to him and offered a smile that had him blinking. “I’m afraid I’m terribly dense about your area of expertise. I don’t understand why one global investment firm needs to do business with another. Aren’t you in competition with each other?”

From the convoluted explanation the man launched into regarding global connectivity, she discerned that the answer was yes. And no.

But most important, she thought, was the expression he was barely able to mask when she first asked the question. When the financial collapse happened a while back, Patterson Capital’s downfall had dealt a blow to Dennison International as well.